IPG Photonics Acquires Mobius Photonics

OXFORD, Mass., March 13, 2013 — IPG Photonics Corp. announced late Wednesday it has acquired privately held Mobius Photonics to accelerate entry of IPG's fiber into the ultraviolet laser market and broaden its opportunities in fine processing. Specific terms, including the purchase price, were not disclosed.

Mountain View, Calif.-based Mobius, founded in 2005, provides high-power pulsed UV fiber lasers for micromachining — such as dicing and scribing of wafers — and VIA drilling and solar hybrid panel processing. The company's revenue in 2012 was approximately $1.4 million. Its employees will become part of the IPG Silicon Valley Technology Center, IPG said.

“The acquisition of Mobius Photonics will augment our current development efforts in UV fiber lasers to quickly penetrate the UV laser market, which we believe could be a significant sales driver for IPG in the coming years," said IPG Photonics CEO Dr. Valentin Gapontsev. “The market has been waiting for a cost-effective, reliable and stable UV fiber laser. Now that we can combine Mobius’ UV laser expertise experience with IPG’s low-cost, proprietary fiber, pump diode and component technologies, we believe that we can effectively build a presence in the fine processing market.”

Mobius co-founder and chairman, Dr. Robert Byer, said the combination will provide its customers with low-cost advanced UV fiber lasers. Byer, a professor of applied physics at Stanford University, was the 2009 winner of the the highest award given by the Optical Society of America, the Frederic Ives Medal. He is immediate past president of the American Physical Society and is a past president of OSA and of the IEEE Lasers and Electro-Optics Society (IEEE LEOS).

In the acquisition, IPG acquired an exclusive license of US Patent No. 5,745,284, an early and broad patent claiming pulsed fiber lasers with frequency conversion into UV light, as well as other Mobius patents, licenses and trade secrets, IPG said.